war_among_the_starsfandomcom-20200213-history
Zietzle's Briefing
''AF 1496 The Archenar System ''On Board the Ducal Navy Flagship Ancestral Right, In High Orbit over Odros II "Seig Heil!" snapped Major Beck, saluting smartly as he entered the Generaloberst's chambers. Zeitzle saluted back and straightened his grey dress uniform. Metals tinkled softly on his chest. "Major?" "They are ready for you sir." said Beck, and Zeitzle nodded. "The Lord General has asked you join him in the briefing room." "Dismissed, Major." Beck saluted, turned on his heels and marched out of the general's room. Heinrich Zeitzle watched him go, thoughtfully. Beck was a competent soldier, and his fanaticism was unquestioned, but Zeitzle wondered privately whether the major was the most efficient possible fit for his role. The major had of course thrown himself whole-heartedly into the task of drilling, organizing and maximizing the operational efficiency of the Duchy regular forces...but he seemed to be under the impression that was all ''he was supposed to be doing here among these lesser humans. Beck would be at home fighting the enemies of the Reich and Fuhrer on the frontlines, without question, but here in the Archenar System more subtlety and imagination were called for, perhaps, than the major possessed. Here, friends were potential enemies. Here, the servants of the Reich were helping to organize and reform an army that they might someday have to fight. The role required more than ideological purity and zeal for following orders to the letter, and Zeiztle considered filing a request for a replacement adjutant, one with a greater initiative, one with an aptitude for intrigue, psychological assessments, and intelligence operations. Zeitzle himself despised the subtleties his role in this foreign and inferior nation required, but he accepted them as his duties to the Fatherland, and carried them out as well as he was able- which was, being honest, very well indeed. The general strode imperiously down the corridor and Duchy staff officers and naval personnel were careful to give him a wide berth. He eyed them coldly, the army officers especially, in their sharp red uniforms and glittering gold epaulettes and braid. When he had first met with the leaders of the Ducal Army, seven long years ago, Zeitzle had considered them little more than costumed idiots who occupied their positions solely by merit of birth. They were unfit to command a platoon, let alone whole armies. Such, frankly, had been Zeitzle's impression not only of the army but indeed of the whole Grand Duchy. A ramshackle joke of a nation governed by a madman and a collection of inbred, inferior clowns, squabbling over petty grievances and dreaming of glories long past. Compared to the cool, efficient unity of the Reich, in which a single, superior ''volk ''was united under the iron ideology of the ''Fuhrerprinzip, the Duchy seemed like a house of cards just waiting for a strong breeze. If the Reich was a fortress of stone and iron, the Duchy was a rambling mansion rotting from within. Kick in the door, and the whole house would come down around you. It had almost-''almost''- made him question the wisdom of the arrangements between the Duchy and the Reich. Only an iron faith in the leadership of the Fuhrer had spared Zietzle the horrifying experience of doubt. Still, Generaloberst Zietzle had almost allowed himself to think that the Federation- for all of its ridiculous notions of individual liberty- was surely the superior nation, racially, ideologically, and militarily. For all of their faults, at least the Federals grasped some principles of the blitzkrieg, of how to use a numerically inferior force to great effect, and of how to efficiently mobilize its own masses. And they didn't employ disgusting aliens and sub-humans to fight for them. The Duchy, in contrast, preferred to wade blindly into battle, despite being full of internal squabbles, and hammer fruitlessly at an enemy with degenerate mercenaries, vile aliens, and half-trained conscripts. So Zietzle had thought, at first. And so the Wehrmacht High Command still thought. Kick in the door with a few hard and fast lightning strikes and the whole ancient edifice will come crashing down. Generaloberst Zeitzle, however, had come to reconsider this assessment of the Grand Duchy, though his colleagues in the Reich military scoffed at him. How many hard, fast strikes had the Federals made in the Derelict War? How many brilliant campaigns of maneuver? And yet the Duchy came on still, heedless, coolly soaking up damage while-and this Zeitzle only suspected- it was quietly preparing for a mass counter offensive. The Duchy numbers were the issue, it had to be admitted. The Fuhrer taught that numbers were nothing when compared to sound tactics, speed, and an iron will for victory, and Zeitzle knew it to be true- had put such teachings into practice himself to great effect in the Eradication Wars, when the Wehrmacht had decimated the innumerable and well armed legions of the foul Vakeshi aliens in a campaign of encirclement. Still, the general mused, numbers didn’t hurt…and he estimated that the Ducal Army, to say nothing of its clone, mercenary and alien auxiliaries, was easily twice the size of the Wehrmacht. While inferior to Reich forces in almost every way, the Ducal Army-as the Derelict War was showing- could shrug off quite staggering losses with ease. And then there were the mercenaries to consider, which the Duchy hired in the millions, and which had so far done the lion’s share of the actual fighting and dying in the Derelict Wars… and then there were the alien legions the Duchy employed, and last but not least the disgusting clones... Flatheads, as the Duchy commanders called them, combat drones- the lowliest subhumans Zietzle had ever encountered-foul, thoughtless amalgams of flesh, metal and weaponry whose only purpose was to advance endlessly at the enemy. The Duchy produced them in endless waves, had been doing so for centuries, and had yet to employ them in any great numbers in its war with the Federation. How many, Zieztle wondered, of the filthy brutes were dormant in cold storage throughout the Archenar System, waiting to be awakened and marched at an enemy? There were other problems too: the Duchy navy was nothing to scoff at, old Imperial ships of the line in good condition, with captains and admirals who had whiled away the centuries fighting off techno-barbarian incursions. Zeitzle was a land-war man, but knew that Wehrmacht High Command considered the Ducal Navy to be the primary obstacle to a successful prosecution of a hypothetical invasion, and maybe they were not wrong about that, even if some senior commanders underestimated the land capabilities of their newly minted allies. Zieztle’s musings were cut short as he approached the briefing room. A meeting of senior personnel had just let out, and various Ducal officers- unearned metals glittering on crimson uniforms- and their retinues were filing out lazily, laughing and chatting, smelling of brandy and pipe smoke. Mustaches and monocles were in abundance. Zieztle suppressed the urge to sneer as he pushed through the throng of these courtiers playing at soldiering, and entered the briefing room. It was a large, rectangular chamber replete with marble flooring, ornate, dark-wood paneling along the walls and a long table of rich tanzik wood. (A ridiculously inefficient use of space and resources aboard a warship, in Zietzle’s opinion.) At the head of the table sat the Countess von Grindehook herself, the closest thing the Duchy had to a Fuhrer. Zietzle supposed she would have been a pretty woman, were her hair lighter and her eyes blue. As it was she looked handsome enough in her white military uniform, well starched and decorated with a tasteful selection of metals. At the very least, she looked nothing like some of the strutting military peacocks who had just left the room. Zietzle had only met the Countess on a few occasions, and had yet to get the measure of her. She tended to listen more than speak, a trait that could either be a sign of great cunning or great stupidity. Next to her sat Lord General Regbert Castamere, tall, erect, severe, cutting an impressive enough figure in his crimson uniform. What Castamere lacked in creativity he more than made up for in cold-blooded competence. He was an intelligent- and, Zeiztle thought, voraciously ambitious- man, who had made an extensive study of Reich strategic ideology well before Zeiztle had arrived in the Archenar System, and had questioned him with such tenacity on the fine points of Wehrmacht battle doctrine that Zeiztle had almost wondered if the Lord General had spent time in the Reich Military Academy. Zeitzle and Castamere had come to a certain level of mutual respect during the Generaloberst’s time in the Grand Duchy, though friendship would be too strong a word for it. Certainly too strong, and most inappropriate. At any rate, Zietzle would be surprised if Castamere had very many friends even among his own people these days, after his role in the Thermidor Purges. The Ducal officer corps had needed a good shakeup- it still did, in Zietzle’s opinion- but even the Generaloberst was astonished at the Countess and Lord General’s systematic decimation of the old army command structure over the course of the last year. The Purges had wreaked havoc at the front too, but that seemed to bother no one in Duchy High Command. There were two other men at the table: the plump and bewhiskered Lord Admiral Quarl, who hid a sharp mind behind his bumbling, avuncular, monocle-polishing exterior, the other was perhaps the most dangerous man in the entire Grand Duchy: Caractacus Veed, head of the Ducal Intelligence Ministry. Veed was a short man in an undecorated black uniform, with a bland, unremarkable face. He sat a little ways down the table from the Countess and the two commanders, smoking a spicy smelling cigarette and examining his fingernails, as though bored. He did not look up at Zietzle. “Your Excellencies,” Zietzle said with a slight nod toward the Countess, as he tried not to choke on the archaic and ludicrous Duchy formalities, “How may I be of service?” “Thank you for coming, Generaloberst,” the Countess said in flawless neo-German, before transitioning to High Imperial, “We are embarking on an ambitious undertaking, and would be most grateful for your expertise and assistance.” Zietzle offered another nod, “The Reich is proud to offer its help to our venerable human comrades.” The Countess glanced at Castamere, who nodded. Zietzle remembered sourly that the Imperials shared a neural uplink that allowed them to communicate in silent data-bursts. Damn augmentics. Damn Imperials. Castamere cleared his throat, and a holographic map of the Contested Systems ignited over the table. “The war is going badly, as you know. The Federals have held the initiative for far too long and UNISEC has proven unexpectedly…formidable. Our recent losses on Yeth and the disaster on Old Colchis has put us in a tenuous position.” Castamere said, bloodlessly, the points on the holo-map zooming in and flashing with data as he mentioned them, “Lord General Nharrod has wisely begun to defensively redeploy the regular forces under his command to our stronghold-worlds of Vvaryl and New Xaxus, while our Drogue auxiliaries attempt to quash another damned rebellion on Orrock. Only in space do we retain an advantage.” “The situation is…precarious,” agreed Zeitzle, blue eyes scanning the three dimensional map. Yeth and Old Colchis were enlarged. But for tiny pockets of Drogue guerilla resistance, Old Colchis had fallen completely to UNISEC. On Yeth, everywhere the red-colored markers which denoted Federation forces advanced against the purple Duchy markers and their green mercenaries. The Generaloberst noted with some satisfaction the small grey markers denoting Reich Volunteer Forces were holding firm on Yeth as Ducal Colonial armies and mercenaries swirled in panicky chaos around them. “Just so,” said Castamere. Lord Admiral Quarl mumbled something and began cleaning his monocle for the forty seven thousandth time since Zietzle had entered the room. “And yet” the Lord General continued, “we are presented with a rare opportunity. The Federation’s offensives have spread their taskforces thin, as well as worn down their UNISEC allies. The time is ripe for a counter-offensive. Lord General Nharrod has commanded several of our Drogue and Shadow Dawn auxiliaries to launch a counter-attack against Old Colchis.” “That is unlikely to succeed, at least without massive losses.” said Zeitzle, studying the map. He noticed from the corner of his eye that Veed was now watching him, his face expressionless. Castamere shrugged, indifferent, “It hardly matters whether it succeeds, and Drogue casualties so far are well within acceptable parameters. An attack now will keep UNISEC busy and wear them down…while we prepare.” “We’re calling the operation Random Gambit,” the Countess cut in “it will feature a…significant investment of our regular forces. I should inform you that General der Infantrie Eberstark is enroute from New Deutschland to take over your current responsibilities. You and your staff will join the planning committee of our counter-offensive.” Zeitzle did not much like the Countess’ imperious tone, treating him as though he were her subject to command, but he decided that in this matter discretion was the better part of valor. The Fuhrer himself had condescended to treat with this woman, and he must have had good reasons for making his deals with the Grand Duchy. It was not for Zeitzle to question, nor to disrupt a budding alliance over a perceived slight. “If the Fuhrer consents to this arrangement, I am content,” replied Zeitzle. “Very good,” said the Countess, rising. Her commanders rose in unison, saluted with the ridiculous Duchy salute- fist against chest-and all three filed out of the room. Zeitzle turned to follow, pondering the new developments. He knew a counter-offensive had been in the works, but for a foreigner to join the planning? Almost unhear- “von Traupitz,” said a soft, almost girlish voice, and Zeitzle turned, his face reddening. Who dared to utter the Fuhrer’s name?! It was Veed. Zietzle realized he had never before heard the man speak. “von Traupitz,” repeated Veed in his strange, fluttering voice, bluish smoke curling from his mouth, “your…Fuhrer. He has been most accommodating. We are truly fortunate to have such dependable and generous friends...but I wonder, my lord general, what is your assessment of our opponent’s friends?” “The corporation?” “Yes the very same. United Security Solutions. Quite adept at the art of war, no? For a corporation.” “Their assault on Old Colchis was impressively executed.” Zeiztle allowed. “Just so. Incredible land-orbital-atmospheric coordination, just the values you are attempting so valiantly to instill in our own forces. How ironic that we and the Federation find ourselves with such similar friends. It's almost poetry.” “I assure you the Fifth Reich is no mercenary company.” “Oh no,” said Veed with a mild smile, “I did not mean to imply that at all. Forgive me. I was only dazzled by the similarity in tactics shared by UNISEC and your…Wehrmacht, is the word?...and also, come to think of it, by your mutual intolerance of non-humans. We in the Duchy are no alien-lovers, I assure you, but we’re rather old fashioned in our tolerance of them, in their place. Quite a different outlook from that of your Fuhrer, and-it seems- of our opponent’s remarkable friends. Quite ironic, how things have turned out... I look forward to working with you general, it will be a rare pleasure.” With that the small man sauntered from the room, a cloud of smoke hanging in his wake. Generaloberst Zieztle watched him go, eyes narrowed, and wondered, not for the first time, if the Imperial Grand Duchy of Far Valyrius was quite so ignorant, quite so clumsy, quite so backwards as it seemed. Category:The Reich Category:The Duchy